"It was not so, it is not so, and, indeed, God it should be so."
I
At the of a hill, about five miles from Great Wymering, Doctor Allingham the of his car, got out, and the road. Gregg seated in the car with his arms folded.
"Aren't you going any further?" he enquired, anxiously.
"No, I'm not," the Doctor, "I've had of this wild-goose chase. And besides, it's nearly dinner time."
"But just now you were to think differently," said Gregg, reproachfully.
"Well, I admit I was by that and wig. But when you come to the thing, what is there in it?" The Doctor was taking long and his leather in the air. "How such a thing be? How can in his right the that Dunn Brothers are still in two thousand years hence? And the Clarkson business. It's on the of it."
"Even an absurdity," said Gregg, quietly, "may the positive truth. I admit it's ludicrous, but we agree that it's inexplicable. We have to on conjecture. To my mind there is something about that in the of familiar to us. Suppose they have a way of going, just as they are? Hasn't the of man always been the permanence of his institutions? And wouldn't it be of man, as we know him to-day, that he should on to purely things, conveniences? In this age we to utility. That's we're in a hurry. Modern life is the last in man's against Time."
He paused, as though to the in his mind. "But Time stopped. Or, rather, man up with Time, the enemy, him to his lair? That would account for the names being the same. Dunn still and Clarkson endures, or their descendants. At any rate, the idea of them persists. Perhaps this clock that they wear death and generations. Of course, it like a joke to us, but we've got to our of for the time being."
"But how it be?" exclaimed107] Allingham, kicking a in his walk. "This clock, I mean. It's—" He for with which to new doubts. "What is this clock?"
"It's an instrument," Gregg, over the of the car. "Evidently it has some of upon the of the organism. That's clear, to me. Probably it some of the ordinary functions and others. One a of glimmer—of an up of the entire organism, and the brain of man new and powers of apprehension. They would have all of second and senses. They would their way about in a larger universe, into all of and unknown to us, of their different construction."
"Yes, yes, I can all that," said Allingham, his moustache, "but let's talk sense."
"In a like this," put in Gregg, "sense is at a premium. What we have to do is to our intuitions."
Allingham frowned. His intuitions, nowadays, were and between.
"When you to my age, Gregg, you'll have something else to do your intuitions. The is, you want all these108] to happen. You have a for the unexpected, like all children and adolescents. But I tell you, the Clockwork man is a myth, and I think you ought to respect my opinion."
"Even if he's a myth," Gregg, "he is still investigating. What me is your positive to the idea that he might be possible. You to want to go out of your way to prove me in the wrong. I may add, that once a man has to in the he is damned."
Allingham a look of anger at the other, and prepared to re-enter the car.
"Well, you prove in the right," he muttered, "and then I'll apologise. I'm going to let the Clockwork man drop. I've got other to think about. And I don't mind telling you that if the Clockwork man out to be all that you for him, I shall still wish him at the other end of the earth."
"Which is where he is now," Gregg, with a note in his voice.
"Well, let him stop there," Allingham, the car with a jerk, "let someone else their about him. I don't want him. I tell you I don't a about the of109] the race. I'm to take the good and in life, and I want it to go on in the same old way."
Gregg his into his open palm. "But that's just what has happened," he exclaimed, "they've a way of on just the same. That the Clarkson business. If the clock is what I think it is, that is its function."
Allingham out some rejoinder, but it was in the of the engine as they along the road.
II
So the had since the telling of Tom Driver's story. Gregg's was to Allingham to see that there might be something in this of a world in which had permanent, the itself, the of man's existence, might have opened up in many new directions. Man might have of waiting for a so long eternity, and one out of his own material tools. The Clockwork man, now in Gregg's mind as an figure, to him to for a of of personal being as to the of mere110] and blood; but the world in which he had different laws, if it had laws at all.
The clock, perhaps, was the of a new and order of things. Man had the very shape of the in order to be able to his without frustration. That was an old of Gregg's. Time and Space were the to man's aspirations, and therefore he had this device, which would his to some of forces. It was a logical step in the path of material progress.
That was Gregg's about the mystery, although, of course, he read into the a good of his own speculations. His upon the clock as the possible symbol of a new in affairs. In his mind he saw man through the ages, until at last, by the of this mechanism, he was able to roll the and the other worlds that beyond, the that the stars, all that had been sealed up in the limited brain of man since creation. From that postulate it would be necessary to work backward, until some be to the working111] of the clock mechanism. That difficulty, even, might be overcome if only an opportunity to this being from the future, or if he be upon to himself.
As the car along, Gregg sat with arms and at the now skies, wondering, as he had before, about that which for centuries of man had respected. No voice had to that mystery. Priests had the gods from that depth, had of the hemispheres, scientists had and the quality of each earth; but still that all the movements of mankind, and closed him in like a over a of ants.
True, it was an illusion, and man had always that. For he had that the more than his limited perceive. And beauty. There had always been the of beauty, the of man to content, while every now and again a great mind and one more to the that man and his final destiny—to know.
And yet, a in man's organs and that wide might and a thousand new forms, like in the clouds at sunset. Physiologists that the of a single to the brain might that man would know the as well as the past. What if that had been performed? By such means man might have come to know not only the future, but other as yet or sketched out by the in brief, terms.
Until that time came, man's about him no nearer to the truth than the child himself to sleep over the problem of what God the universe. Man remained, in that sense, as as a child, from birth to death. Until the of the in his brain a man not actually know.
Einstein say that we were in our conceptions. But he say how we were to right? The Clockwork man might be the beginning.
And then, when that had been wrought, that physical reconstruction, what else might in its train? The Truth at last, an end to all and pain, a solution113] of the problems of civilisation, such as and land distribution, the of in the universe.
But Gregg had the to admit to himself that his was no more than a around the of the future. It was necessary, in the place, to posit an apparatus. After all, the Clockwork man was still a to be solved, and if he failed to a single of conjecture, there still the of out what actually he was and how he had come to earth.
III
Leaving Gregg at his rooms in the upper part of the town, the Doctor slowly along the High Street in the direction of his own house. Everything was now, and there was no of disturbance, no that a had taken place in the town of Great Wymering. The Doctor noted the with satisfaction; it helped him to down, and it was necessary, for the of his digestion, that he should and comforted.
Still, if Gregg's were near the mark, in a very hours it would be114] all over England that the of the had opened and this to the of the present. There would be a great of excitement; the newspapers would be full of the event. Indeed, the whole of the world might be as a result of this revelation.
He would be into the affair. In of himself, he would be to go into some of box and that from the he had the Clockwork man phenomenal, when, as a of fact, he had him a nuisance. But, as one of those who had the on the hill, and as a medical man, he would be to make an statement. One had to be about such things.
And the truth was that he had no to himself in the matter. It his equilibrium, and the of that world of which him to make light, easy at its and incongruities.
Besides, it was to that, in middle life, he was no longer in the of and fears; but a backslider, to the time when and had become115] too difficult for comfort. Regarded in this way, nothing for the years, the extinguished, the rich for doubts—unless, indeed, it was the that such was the common of mankind. The old world rolled on from to generation, and nothing to people out of their with passions, and ambitions. Miracles were to have at in world-history, but they were by a of comment, or up by those were ground in a world that be upon to go on itself.
A world! Of course, there were malcontents. When the shoe pinched, would out for fire from heaven. But if a plebiscite were to be taken, it would be that an majority would be in of a world without miracles. If, for example, it be that this Clockwork man was a being in many to the of mankind, he would be out of by a and humanity.
But the Clockwork man was not. He had been, and, indeed, God he should be.
With that his mind, the Doctor ran his car into the garage, and with some return of his manner, with something of that in a solid earth which is a necessary to the of juices, opened the door of his house.
IV
Mrs. Masters was in the room him. The Doctor in without stopping to remove his or place his aside, a of his upon which Mrs. Masters was occasionally to him; for the good lady was not slow to give for when the opportunity arose, and she to these of the Doctor's ways. But for the moment her mood to be one of blandishment.
"A lady called to see you this evening," she announced, smilingly.
The Doctor his as though in of the mention of his visitor. "Did you give her my love?" was his light rejoinder, still at an angle.
"Indeed, no," Mrs. Masters, "it wouldn't be my place to give such messages. Not as though she weren't enough117]—with questions about this and that. As though it were any of 'ers 'ow you choose to your house'old."
"On the contrary, I am flattered," said the Doctor, at this new example of Lilian's originality. "But tell me, Mrs. Masters, am I not more successful with the ladies?" As he spoke, he with his the of himself in the mirror.
"You don't need to be of that fact, I'm sure," Mrs. Masters, "life on you. I fear, too lightly. If I might to say so, a man in your position ought to take life more seriously."
"My would with you."
"Ah, well, I you that. They say you more with your than with your physic."
"I value my more than my prescriptions," laughingly the Doctor, "But, tell me, what was the lady's of my menagé? And that me, you have not told me her name yet. Did she a red parasol, or was it a white one?"
"I'm sure I noticed," Mrs. Masters, "such don't me. But her name was Miss Lilian Payne—"
The Doctor with a guffah. "Come, Mrs. Masters, we need not about118] the bush. I you are aware of our relationship. Did you her agreeable?"
"Pretty middling," said Mrs. Masters, reluctantly, "although at I was put out by her manners. Such these modern give themselves. But she got me in the end with her ways, and I myself taking 'er all the 'ouse, which of I ought not to 'ave done without your permission."
"Tell me," said the Doctor, without moving a in his face, "was she satisfied with her of my premises?"
"There now!" Mrs. Masters, an on the of a chair, "I won't tell you that, because, of course, I don't know."
She the door.
"But did she any message?" the Doctor, her with his eye-glass.
"Botheration!" Mrs. Masters, in tones, "now you've asked me and I've got to tell you. I wanted to keep it back. Oh, I do you're not going to be disappointed. I'm sure she didn't it."
"What did she say," the Doctor, irritably.
"She says to me, she says, 'Tell him there's nothing doing.'"
There was a pause. Mrs. Masters in119] her lip and her arms stiffly. The Doctor hard at her for a moment, and almost himself. Then he his and laughed with the air of a man to all of life, great and small, had the object of a hilarity. "Then upon some other lady will the honour," he observed.
"You mean—" Mrs. Masters, and then him with the meaning of a woman or for some other woman. "That lady is not to you, at all events," she continued, her head.
"Evidently not," the Doctor, carelessly, "but it is not of the importance. As I have said, the honour—"
"Ah," in Mrs. Masters, "there's only one woman for you, and you have yet to her."
"There's only one woman for me, and that is the woman who will me. Nay, don't lecture me, Mrs. Masters. I the to your eye. I am to approach this question of in the of which you admit is my good or genius. Life is a comedy, and in order to in it one must assume the rôle of the who through the scenes, fun at those sober-120]minded upon the very depends. I will in and in laughter."
"Incorrigible man," said Mrs. Masters. But the Doctor had his upon her, to the in his features. Even as he spoke those light words, there came to him the that he did not them, and his to to dust. He had up to these for years, but now he that they were nothings. As though to the of a trying day, there came to him the that his whole life had been an of gestures, of gesticulations.
V
Over an he to think out, all the time that he was missing opportunities through inattention.
Of course, Lilian's of his menagé would have been unsatisfactory, though he had her over the house himself; but it was that she should have to come alone. Holding opinions about the of the house, and of the woman's therein,121] she would his as unwieldy, overcrowded, old-fashioned, musty. It would to her responsibilities, without reward, meaningless ostentation. The Doctor's own tastes in the direction of massive, furniture, rich and hangings, a of ornaments. He liked a house to the with things. He was a and of and ends, of that had necessary to his moods. He was proud of his house, with its seventeen rooms, two rooms, four in a of readiness, like fire-stations, for old friends who always said they were and did; its and servants' quarters. Then there were little rooms which a woman of taste would be able to according to her whim, workrooms, snuggeries, and landings. There was much in the place that ought to to a woman with right instincts.
Was Lilian going to their for the of these modern heresies? Surely she would not him over now; and yet her message left that impression. Nowadays were so by their sensibilities. Lilian's nature might at122] the of with him in the of his own choice.
He would look such a if the match did not come off. He had so many for her sake, that were undignified, but necessary in a country town where every detail of daily life common knowledge. That was why he would appear so if the marriage did not take place. It had been necessary, in the place, to himself in the particular by Lilian's parents, and although this manœuvre had a from his already principles, and an almost insincerity, the Doctor had it without much scruple. He had his position as Vicar's at the church, and a in a at the Baptist chapel; for Lilian's father the religion of self-made men. He had to the local society, and medical articles to the local paper on the of and the of midwives. In the winter he gave on "The Wonders of Science." He a P.S.A., delivered to Young Men Only, and did all he to the Baptist cause, which, in123] Great Wymering, not only for of religious belief, but also for the of daily life by scientific knowledge and common sense. All that had been necessary in order to with the Payne family; for they the most good health, and the Doctor had of an opportunity to anti-toxins in for tea.
But the class to which the Paynes were not humble. They were in origin, and the semi-aristocratic of Great Wymering was to them. They had come from the London in response to of sites, and their enterprise had been amazing. Within a years Great Wymering had to be a country town, with to the Roman occupation; it was to travellers on the South-Eastern and Chatham railway as the place where Payne's Dog Biscuits were manufactured.
The Doctor, in himself in the right quarter, had to allow for the that the that had the Paynes out of their had to their daughter. Lilian had been educated, and although the Doctor it124] to himself a hundred times a week, there was no the that an brain her beauty. True, the fruits of her learning a little in Great Wymering, and that a permanent and a to argue about modern problems, she no against the of her existence, but appeared, and willowy, at garden parties or drives. It was the of her mind that the Doctor feared, as, all at first, he had as its stimulant. During their talks together he had spoken too many a true word in jest; and his had to Lilian a whole world about which to think and theorise.
He up at her photograph on the mantelpiece. If there was a in the of her fair, Saxon beauty, it was that the mouth was a little too large and opened too easily, teeth that were not as regular as they should be. But nature's often sets the seal on man's choice, and to the Doctor this fault gave and to a that might easily have been cold and impassive, as her were and she had no great art in the use of them. Her voice, too, often the by its occasional note that125] an of under control.
In the Doctor to off his and assume the air of to him when his coffee and of Lilian. Such an be to the of love. It was not Romeo's "heavy lightness, vanity." It was a perplexity, a that something had gone with him, something that he was unable to diagnose. It not be that he was old. As a medical man he his age to an artery. And yet, in of his physical and chastity, he that he was not a fit for this girl with her mind. He had always been about morals, without being moral, but there was something him that he did not to contemplate. It almost as though the of the mind were more than those of the flesh, for the themselves in action and re-action, while the in the mind, there to and the very of all activity.
What was it then—this of a of himself—of a of his faculties? Was it some new of the modern world, a of mind as yet not126] by the or thinker? It was difficult to a clear image to his condition; yet that was his need. There was no phrase or word in his memory that his feeling.
And then there was the Clockwork man—something else to think about, to be at.
At this point in the Doctor's the door opened and Mrs. Masters in the Curate, very and in need of medical attention. His was all awry, and the look upon his was that of a man who has looked long and at some object and not himself of the image. "I've had a shock," he began, trying to recognition. "Sorry you—meal time—" He into a saddle-bag chair and arms expressively. "There was a man—" he got out.
The Doctor his mouth and produced a stethoscope. His manner professional. He phrases and a chair closer to his patient.
"There was a man," the Curate, in ancient-mariner-like tones, "at the Templars' Hall. I he was the conjurer, but he wasn't—at least, I don't think so. He did things—impossible things—"
"What of things," the Doctor, slowly, as he to the Curate's heart. "You must make an to yourself."
"He—he appear," the Curate, with a great effort, "out of nowhere—positively."
"Well, isn't that what are to do?" the Doctor, blandly.
But the Curate his head. Fortunately, in his professional there was no need for the Doctor to surprise. On the contrary, it was necessary, for his patient's sake, to control. He against the and to the Curate's account of his with the Clockwork man, and his gravely.
"Well, now," he prescribed, "complete for a days, in a posture. I'll give you something to you down. Evidently you've had a shock."
"It's very hard," the Curate complained, "that my should have me from more. The was but the was weak."
"Very likely," the Doctor suggested, "someone has played a upon you. Perhaps your own nerves are to blame. Men with nerves like you are very to—er—hallucinations."
"I wonder," said the Curate, the of his chair, "I wonder, now, if Moses like this when he saw the bush."
"Ah, very likely," the Doctor, of the opportunity to his analogy. "There's not the least that many so-called in the past had their in some pathological condition at the time. Moses from some of hysteria—a of hypnosis. Even in those days there was the problem of breakdown."
His voice died away. The Curate was not actually his head, but there was upon his an of incredulity, the like of which the Doctor had not upon a face, for it was the of a man to all against the are in themselves unbelievable. It was a expression, and with it there a of the Curate's eyelids, a of his lips, a of small white hands.
"I'm your won't water," he rejoined. "I can't myself not to in what I saw. You see, all my life I have been trying to in miracles, in manifestations. I have always said that if only we ourselves to accept what is not obvious. My best have been upon129] that subject: of the of ourselves into the state. Sometimes the Vicar has objected. He to think I was it on deliberately. But I you, Doctor Allingham, that I have always wanted to believe—and, in this case, it was only my and my that me to such an opportunity."
The Doctor himself up stiffly, and just the door. "I think you need a holiday," he remarked, "and a from pursuits. And don't forget. Rest, for a days, in a posture."
"Thank you," the Curate beamed, "I'm the Vicar will be very annoyed, but it can't be helped."
They were in the now, and the Doctor was the door open.
"But it happened," the Curate whispered. "It did happen—and we shall and see more. I only I shall be well to it. We are in great days."
He on the doorstep, his hands together and looking up at the as though to see a sign. "It me at first," he resumed, "because he was such an odd-looking person, and the whole was on the side. I wanted to laugh at him,130] and it me so disgraceful. But I'm sure he was a of something, an apotheosis."
"Don't home," the Doctor. "Take quietly."
"Oh, yes, of course. The is a instrument. One that. So good of you. But the endures. Good night."
He along the High Street. The Doctor the door for a long while and that figure, nursing a and along, in of to the contrary.
